Ourselves we do inter with sweet derision
by jomiddlemarch
Summary: What Ross sees in the shadows.


Ross looked around the parlour, as best he could with the shadows all taking the place of any sunlight, though the day had not yet died. The plain room needed the cheer of a spring morning or a hearth with a merry, dancing fire to have any appeal and yet where else was there to go? He had shut himself up in his study for hours, trying to make the account books tell a different answer, and had spent the morning, since shortly after dawn, at Wheal Leisure. Demelza had woken briefly when he arose, but her eyes had been cloudy with sleep and he'd not said a word to her then or since he'd returned home. Her hair was the brightest thing in the room now, her head bent over her mending, her skirts already drab without the failing light of day bleaching them of color. He walked over to where she sat and looked down at her but she didn't look up at him.

"It's dark in here—and cold as well. Why didn't you have Prudie light a fire?" he asked impatiently. He expected some conciliatory remarks, an apology, that small wrinkle in her brow that appeared when she was worried about his response.

"We've no kindling left—the driftwood's all used up and I was that busy today with getting the linens washed and hung out, all the pots needed scouring, and Yarrow needed attendin', she was groanin' something fierce and I thought she might lose the calf," his wife responded and there was little softness in her tone. She hadn't lifted her head from her sewing, a pile of his shirts beside her and some other things, he couldn't make them out, in an overflowing basket by her feet.

"Why are you the one fetching the firewood, Demelza? The mistress of Nampara? You're not a scullery maid any longer, try to remember that," he scolded, irritable with the chill in the air, the dirty, empty hearth, the lack of attention she was giving him.

"Well, who else is going to do it, I'd like to know! Perhaps if you made it clear you were the master, Prudie and Jud would take their orders from you, but you're never about and they'll hardly listen to me…There's a foreman at the mine for you, but not here, here there's only me and Garrick, sour old Prudie with her everlastin' complaints, Jud half-dead from drink by noon. Judas!" Demelza exclaimed angrily. She'd raised her voice almost from the first but her color hadn't risen with it and she'd kept sewing, stabbing at the cloth as if she'd murder the seam until she'd miscalculated and the needle had found its home in her thumb.

The room was dim, but he was close enough to make out the marks on her hands as she quickly set down the half-mended shirt; there were scrapes and blisters that had burst, a healing burn at the base of her left hand, her nails broken. He'd never seen a lady's hands look so. Elizabeth's hands were slender and white, dainty with rings and framed with frothy lace. Verity's palms were more square and dimpled, but every finger ended in a delicate half-moon. His mother's he remembered as very soft when she laid them on his head, testing him for a fever, or only pleasing herself with the memory of his child's face. Demelza's hands were a testament to her life, the manual labor she did without complaint, without assistance, the wounds she would not have thought to mention or bandage. She needed a salve, something rich with goose grease and herbs, clean, fresh linen to bandage the worst injuries, and a rest—someone else to fetch and carry, midwife the cow, to heave great iron pots from the fire and scrub them with sand, to brave brambles and thorns to lay the fire.

He had congratulated himself on marrying her, what a good man he was to save her honor, her virtue, to ignore her lowliness, but she shamed him with the gifts she gave, gifts he barely acknowledged and never thanked her for. She had offered her loyalty and service, her body and soul, her tenacity and persistence and tireless effort to give him a home, the best she could make, and he threw it back at her without a thought.

Ross knelt before her and took her hands in his, as gently as he could. He turned them up and saw the cut on the right palm, the calluses on every finger, the small, welling bead of blood on her thumb.

"I'm sorry, Ross, I shouldn't have spoken so… I expect I can find a little firewood if you'll only give me a few minutes. There's rum or claret for you to take your ease with," she said tiredly, barely noticing how he held her, already planning how she would serve him next. She took a deep breath and it was a sigh, one that meant she didn't expect any help, that she would manage alone as he'd left her to every day since he'd wed her.

"No. Look at me, Demelza. I am the one, I owe you the apology, I owe you the respect due the mistress of the house and the kindness due my wife and I owe you this, these" pressing a soft kiss in each hand, "Simply for that you are Demelza. If you were prepared to bring in firewood within a few minutes, I can certainly do the same, and you should lay aside your work and sit with your glass of spirits. I know you prefer tea, but we'll need the fire for that."

He'd astonished her, he saw that, and it left him with the demoralizing realization that she expected none of it from him, not the apology or the recognition, not the caress that was only for her pleasure and care and not to gratify his appetites. She had made vows and kept them, with all her heart, for all that she was beneath him, and he, a fine gentleman and the King's own officer, a Poldark of Nampara, had broken nearly every promise he'd so hastily made.

"Ross…" she said. Was it a question? Would she push him away?

"Let go of my hands, they're…you oughtn't look at them, they're not the hands of a lady," she said, all her lovely fire gone out.

"They're the hands of my lady and I mean to look at them every day. And make sure they are healing here," he laid a careful finger by one injury after another, stroking lightly, tracing the shape of her palm, feeling the roughness of her finger-tips, the silk of the skin at her narrow wrists. "Here and here and here, I'll make sure you have what is needful…and more than that, in every way. I'll do better… but I suspect you will need to remind me. I'm a most terribly selfish man and I need a firm hand, your sweet hand, Demelza, to guide me," Ross said, bringing her right hand to his mouth, kissing her wrist where her pulse beat.

"Lay down your work and wait for me. Please," he added.

There was something new in her regard, a delight he had never seen, not the satisfaction of a full belly or the tender pride at being called Mrs. Poldark, something rare and precious, and it was enough to make them both silent as she nodded. He'd seen plenty of branches down just a few yards from Nampara and would be able to fill the basket and be back before she could wonder if she'd imagined it all. He wanted to see that same expression in the firelight, the glow reflected on her face, the warmth making her cheeks rosy, ready to hear a new set of promises, even if only he understood what exactly he was saying.


End file.
